Polar bears in damaged health are by definition less able to withstand the rigors ordinary in arctic life--let alone to survive in the face of climate change, habitat loss and long-term hunger. By itself, reducing toxic pollution cannot hope to save them; it can diminish the assaults on their health, and in that way help give them a fighting chance.

The by-products, the toxic chemical residues of human production, are not only at the polar bear’s door, but in the polar bear. . . . Sonne and his colleagues believe a complex of POPs known to be endocrine-system disruptors have steeply raised the threat of reproductive failure for polar bears, presenting a “serious challenge to the species’ survival."